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Indybay Feature

Saboteurs Cut Nets and Release 40,000 Fish In California

by Voice of the Voiceless
Anonymous saboteurs use wire cutters to release thousands of fish from nets
20111004__nmij1004salmon1_gallery1_1_.jpg

From Voice of the Voiceles

Anonymous saboteurs use wire cutters to release thousands of fish from nets

In what may be the largest liberation of animals in U.S. history, nets were cut at a holding pen in the San Francisco bay this week, releasing 40,000 fish into the wild.

There has not yet been a claim of responsibility by the Animal Liberation Front or other group.

A police spokesperson describes how the fish were released:

“(one or more people) came along with essentially what are wire cutters to do this. It was purposeful. Someone knew what they were doing.”

An employee at the institute where the salmon were held says he speculates this may be the act of an animal rights group.

The pens were part of a program run by the Tiburon Salmon Institute, in partnership with a pro-fishing student group at nearby Casa Grande High School. According to Tiburon, the fish were being tended to by the students, who intended to release them into the wild themselves later in the month.

The website for the Tiburon Salmon Institute would seem to corroborate this story, where they take credit for “releasing over a million salmon into our San Francisco Bay” over the last 30 years.

Were the fish going to be released into the wild anyway? There could be a couple of things at work here. The claims that the fish were to be released anyway could be a public relations-oriented lie. Those who cut the nets may not have known the fish were slated to be released in the coming weeks. Or, they could have chosen to risk themselves anyway to give the fish a few extra weeks of freedom, sparing them the psychological suffering of being kept in intense confinement with approximately 40,000 others in a small net.

If this was the act of animal liberators, it would be the largest recorded animal liberation ever in the U.S. The largest previous liberation was the Animal Liberation Front raid of the Drewelow and Sons fur farm in New Hampton, Iowa in 2000; where 14,000 mink were released.

The Tiburon Salmon Institute is now soliciting funds to purchase security cameras.

- Peter Young

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by truth teller
This was obviously a malicious, criminal, non-political act by some lowlifes who lack any knowledge of the Casa Grande Project. The fish are only being held in the pens to raise them to a size where they are better able to deal with predators. They were going to be released anyway by the students!
Did you notice that a commercial fish farm using "Sportsmen" as a front just got a permit to do the same thing at Pillar Point Harbor, near Half Moon Bay.


I have a wet suit and wire cutters!


Join me.

End the water diversions which are the REAL Salmon killers and fart in the face of the Idiots who pretend they can MITIGATE the juvenile salmon kills with industrial size commercial raising pens polluting the oceans!

Industrial fish pens pollute the local waters with concentrated fish feces and food waste (ground up fish), and subject crowded fry populations and wild neighbors to disease, has been demonstrated in the fish farming in the pacific northwest.

End this false flag initiative by soul less industry, even if it means burning down facilities at Tiburon and Pillar Point/Half Moon Bay!.
by Anonymous
Hey Sludge, I understand your disapproval of large-scale commercial salmon farming. I think a lot of people reading this article may not understand that this was a grassroots environmental restoration effort that has been going on for several decades. It is run by a small non profit group that rears salmon in order to release them and improve the health of our bay's ecosystem. This is used primarily as an educational tool for high school students who assist in the raising and releasing salmon and in the process learn a great deal about the bay's ecology and a gain a sense of empowerment and responsibility for their region's ecosystems. What is being done here is the absolute antithesis to commercial salmon farming operations. While these fish were going to be released, the saboteur's action ensured that they will have a much decreased survival rate and that an opportunity for environmental education outreach is lost.

The facility you are advocating burning down is housed within a small university research station which is devoted to ecological research focused on restoration of the bay, effects of climate change, and the effects of that water diversion you mentioned. The primary threats to this facility are budget cuts to higher education encouraged by the right wing.

Because of the location of the salmon pens, they would have probably been approached with a boat and cut in what would have had to be a very planned deliberate action. It would be a surprising choice of target for a random vandal. Because of that and the show of support from the radical animal rights community, it has been assumed that this was the work of ALF sympathizers. I think it was likely carried out by someone who likes the concept of being a "radical" but is somewhat of a coward and a moron....my suspicions would fall on some local rich kid.
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